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Even though Sadtu has been engaged in an illegal strike for weeks in the Eastern Cape, President Zuma last night praised teacher unions like Sadtu for supporting the campaign to be “in school, in class, on time, teaching for at least seven hours a day.”

Then the President laughed, as if to acknowledge that he knew – like everyone else in Parliament and across the country – that his statement was so obviously false that it would be taken as a joke. But Mr President, no one is laughing.

For the duration of the illegal strike in the Eastern Cape, tens of thousands of learners received little to no teaching at all. The effects this reckless approach by unions will have on the children’s attitude toward their teachers and learning when Sadtu members return to the classroom next week is yet to be felt.

The President’s glib praise for a teachers’ union that has spent most of this year disrupting schools, avoiding the classroom and teaching less than 7 hours a day makes a mockery of the leadership required from his office.

Sadtu does not embrace the President’s 3Ts campaign – teaching, textbooks and time. The union has resisted every measure to improve teacher quality through greater accountability.

It has come out strongly against the performance agreements between principals and provincial education Ministers. It has resisted the implementation of competency tests for matric markers, which would assure the highest standards for matric assessments. And it has rejected any discussion of limiting teachers’ right to strike, insisting that they should be allowed to use their students’ educations as leverage in negotiations with the government.

The President was wrong to thank Sadtu in his State of the Nation speech. Rather he should have singled them out as the single greatest obstacle to quality education for our children. Sadtu’s actions in the Eastern Cape have made that clear yet again.

We call on the President to explain his offensive quip when we debate his State of the Nation address next week.